The New York Times Crossword in Gothic: 11.02.14 — Galileo's Daughter

Sunday, November 2, 2014

ACROSTIC, Puzzle by Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon
Edited by Will Shortz

This Sunday’s intriguing acrostic draws a fragmented quotation from “Galileo’s Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love” by Dava Sobel.

“Inspired by a long fascination with Galileo and by the remarkable surviving letters of his daughter Maria Celeste, a cloistered nun, Dava Sobel has crafted a biography that dramatically recolors the personality and accomplishments of a, mythic figure whose early-seventeenth-century clash with Catholic doctrine continues to define the schism between science and religion—the man Albert Einstein called “the father of modern physics—indeed of modern science altogether.“ …

"Moving between Galileo’s grand public life and Maria Celeste’s sequestered world, Sobel illuminates the Florence of the Medicis and the papal court in Rome during the pivotal era when humanity’s perception of its place in the cosmos was about to be overturned. During that same time, while the bubonic plague wreaked its terrible devastation and the Thirty Years’ War tipped fortunes across Europe, Galileo sought to reconcile the Heaven he revered as a good Catholic with the heavens he revealed through his telescope. Filled with human drama and scientific adventure, Galileo’s Daughter is an unforgettable story." ~ Amazon.com

The quotation: GALILEO ARRIVED AT [THE]… RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DISTANCE AND TIME WITHOUT… A RELIABLE UNIT OF MEASURE OR AN ACCURATE CLOCK. ITALY POSSESSED NO NATIONAL STANDARDS…, GAUGING… BY FLEA’S EYES, HAIRBREADTHS,… HAND SPANS,… AND THE LIKE.

The author’s name and the title of the work: DAVA SOBEL, “GALILEO’S DAUGHTER”

The defined words:

A. Full, rich outpouring of melodious sound; tuning fork, DIAPASON
B. Heed an alarm, come to life, AWAKEN
C. Ready to erupt at any moment, VOLATILE
D. Profoundly bad, ABYSMAL
E. Body with rngs that were first seen in 1610, SATURN
F. Angle-determining instrument used in celestial navigation, OCTANT
G. Engage in a b-boying battle (hyph.), BREAK-DANCE
H. Ground zero for a temblor, EPICENTER
I. Realm of Croesus, now part of Turkey, LYDIA
J. Worker also known as an aurifex, GOLDSMITH
K. Come before, be older than, ANTEDATE
L. Balance in the sky, LIBRA
M. Rashly, without due consideration (2 wds.), IN HASTE
N. Complying with the rules, LAWFUL
O. Act of climbing the walls as a siege tactic, ESCALADE
P. Kowtowing or bowing, OBEISANT
Q. Horn signaling the end of Yom Kimpur, SHOFAR
R. Long coat worn in westerns, DUSTER
S. Cooper, potter or weaver, e.g., ARTISAN
T. Surplus; idle; pristine, UNUSED
U. Band with the 1986 hit “Land of Confusion”, GENESIS
V. Acme, climax, zenith, peak (2 wds.), HIGH POINT
W. Idea-based, speculative, THEORETIC
X. Give a stamp of approval, ENDORSE
Y. Physics Nobelist of 1904 who explained why the sky is blue, RAYLEIGH

The full paragraph of the quotation: “Just as Copernicus had discerned the configuration of the solar system with no telescope to guide him, Galileo arrived at this fundamental relationship between distance and time without so much as a reliable unit of measure or an accurate clock. Italy possessed no national standards in the seventeenth century, leaving distances open to guesstimate gauging by flea’s eyes, hairbreadths, lentil or millet seed diameters, hand spans, arm lengths, and the like. Even a braccio differed in dimension depending on whether it was measured in Florence, Rome, or Venice, and so Galileo delineated his own arbitrary units along the length of his experimental apparatus. As long as these units matched one another, he could use them to establish fundamental relationships."

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